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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23520436">The Portrait in the Attic</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/RavenpuffLove/pseuds/RavenpuffLove'>RavenpuffLove</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Harry Potter Next Generation, Marauders Era (Harry Potter), Portraits, Time Turner (Harry Potter)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 14:13:49</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>7,995</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23520436</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/RavenpuffLove/pseuds/RavenpuffLove</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Victoire is hoping some of the paintings in Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny's attic at Grimmauld Place are interesting enough to curate for the history section of her magical artistry apprenticeship, but she finds much more than she bargained for.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Regulus Black/Victoire Weasley</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>63</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>50</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Sing Me a Rare: The Mash-Ups</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The Portrait in the Attic</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Thank you so much for your work as Alpha and Beta on this piece granger_danger. Working with you truly makes me a better writer!</p><p>Written for Sing Me a Rare: Mash Ups.</p><p>Song Prompt –  Far to Young to Die - Panic! At the Disco<br/>Lovely - Billie Eilish</p><p>This story won <br/>Best Overall<br/>And <br/>The Pairing You didn't know you needed. </p><p>Thank you so much to anyone who voted for me and for all the wonderful comments I received 😭😭😭 you truly don't know how much it means to me. </p><p>Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No copyright infringement is intended. No profit is being made from this creation.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>In all the many times Victoire had been to Grimmauld Place, she had never been in the attic. Through all the sleepovers, babysitting hoards of little Potters and Weasleys on summer holiday, and grown-up dinners after she and Teddy had broken up in seventh year, that area of the house had remained a mystery. It wasn't that it was against the rules to go up the rickety stairs to the final level, but it was so obvious that Harry and Ginny avoided the room that it seemed too disrespectful to bother exploring, especially when James had assured them that it was just a bunch of old furniture and paintings covered up with sheets and piles of feathers and hippogriff droppings. It certainly hadn't made venturing up sound appealing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As she opened the door now, the sight of sheets turned a misty grey with dust covering furniture and stacks of paintings was absolutely the most lovely and inviting finding she could imagine.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The 25-year-old hippogriff droppings and feathers were less so. Her first task was setting a broom after them and vanishing the piles that collected, instantly freshening the room. One wall of the attic was filled with windows, sheet-covered like the contents. Victoire pulled them down, filling the dark room with early morning light that made the floating dust into a glowing haze.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The first column of paintings she uncovered was somewhat familiar: magical landscapes full of wide open fields and meadows, with hazy figures moving in the far distance, some that might be unicorns or even centaurs, a few humanoids of indeterminate species, one that was almost certainly a giant. Even at a cursory glance she was almost certain they were attributable to the same artist who had painted a few of the landscapes that hung in the great stair at Hogwarts. The brush work was similar as were the golden green color palettes. She'd have to get them out of their frames and get a look at the signatures and the backs.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This kind of work was just what she needed for her final historical section of her apprenticeship. She was desperate to be done with it, no matter how quickly she progressed. It wasn't that she didn't respect her artistry master, she truly did. Dennis Creevey was unusually talented at the theory and practice of imbuing artwork. He wasn't a particularly skilled painter but his photographic portraits were true masterpieces. All the vivid realism of photography, but able to reproduce more than a visual snapshot. They didn't have the spark of life that painted portraits had but she couldn't deny how lovely it was to know that she could keep brief messages for her loved ones. But the truth was that as much as she would never tire of learning, Victoire was tired of being a student. She wanted to do something new, something exciting, on her own.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The next column was Muggle art, surprising in the historical Black family residence. Some of it was quite lovely. Pre-Raphaelite women with dark, wild hair and matching steely grey eyes that screamed they belonged to the Noble and Ancient House of Black. Aunt Hermione would love them. She loved transgressive artwork that showed magical history in a different light.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She was looking at a particularly engaging rendering of what seemed to be Lady Godiva that greatly resembled a young Andromeda Tonks when she noticed that the backing on this painting's ornate frame was loose; some canvas had escaped the edge at an odd angle. Victoire carried the painting closer to the window, turning it and propping it against a rickety chair so that she could get to the lifted corner of backing. The canvas peeking out at the edge didn't belong to the equestrienne nude from the front at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The painting she revealed as she pulled off the backing could easily have been mistaken for another Muggle piece. The young man pictured was sitting in a chair, hands clasped loosely in his lap and chin resting forward just a bit, eyes closed, as though he'd just fallen asleep. It was only on close inspection that the magic revealed itself. When she noticed that the chair the young man was sitting on looked remarkably like the one on which the painting was currently leaning, and that the pedestal and urn in the corner had certainly once held the fern taking up the right edge of the space, she began to look for the signs. She only had to watch for a moment to see the gentle rise and fall of the sitter's chest.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She gave the man a tap on his shoulder and whispered, “Sir,” a few moments before concluding that it wasn't just an imbued portrait, it was unwoken.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>How would an unwoken portrait find its way into the back of a frame in the attic of Grimmauld Place? Especially an unwoken portrait of someone she didn't recognize. Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny were very popular, but they truly spent all their time with the same people they'd been friends with since they were sixteen with very little variation.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire sat back on the floor and studied the painting.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The young man was close to her age, 19 or 20. His dark hair was thick and wavy, falling onto his forehead becomingly. He had fine, handsome features that reminded her intensely of the few pictures she'd seen of Uncle Harry's godfather, Sirius Black, when he was young. . . but it wasn't him. The clothes were wrong. In almost all the photographs of Sirius he was wearing Muggle denims. Not to mention Sirius had kept his hair long. This young man wasn't wearing robes, but his clothing was decidedly old fashioned: a black vest over a shirt with billowing sleeves and a high collar. It could have been from any number of years considering the wizarding propensity for stagnating fashion, and Victoire had almost given up on placing the subject of the portrait when he shifted in his sleep and the movement unveiled the bottom edge of an unmistakable brand on his inner left forearm: the dark mark.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Regulus Black.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The portrait was of a man who'd been dead since 1979.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It had been unwoken for 40 years. There had to be something wrong with it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Imbued portraits woke when their subjects died even if they hadn't been woken while they lived. It was that simple. If it moved then it should have more than his likeness. It should have his personality, his voice, his memories up until the time of painting. It shouldn't still be asleep unless someone had charmed it to not wake, but no common charms brought him to life. Perhaps the charm required a triggering phrase to lift.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire studied the painting for a long while, peeling it fully out of the frame and examining the edges and back for any signatures or notation. The brushwork was so familiar, a little rough, a sharpness in the lines of the face that called to her. She only found a short note scribbled on the back in half-smeared ink.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>It's lovely. Goodbye.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>That short note haunted her. She couldn't stop looking at it. It stuck so thoroughly in her mind that she rolled the painting up and tucked it under her arm before she apparated home, not even bothering to ask Uncle Harry before she took it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****************************************</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Knock. Knock. Knock.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The sound was so unusual that Regulus almost dismissed it as a creation of his troubled mind. It wouldn't be the first time he had imagined something since coming to the decision to defy the Dark Lord, and therefore end his life. It seemed like around every corner was the specter of his brother, a barking laugh and the shaking head that seemed to say 'I told you so”. He was the easiest to ignore since Regulus was well aware that Sirius was alive and thwarting the Dark Lord at every turn.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Not every figment was so easy to ignore.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Regulus found himself running to check in on Kreacher in his nest several times a day, convinced that he heard the pitiful moaning and pleading that had chilled his blood the day that the Dark Lord had made use of the family servant. He couldn't convince himself that the horrible potion's effects wouldn't return full force and claim the old elf's life.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Knock. Knock. Knock.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Growing up in an unplottable home with a floo connection, Regulus was almost certain he had never heard a knock at the front door. It seemed like a strange hallucination for his mind to choose.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Regulus decided the best thing to do would be to answer it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His troubled mind might have been able to conjure the sound of an unexpected knock at the door, but there was no way it could have created the woman standing on the other side of the door.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She was unbearably lovely. Almost painfully so. Her heart shaped face was dominated by large hazel eyes under dark, striking brows. A slightly upturned nose and gently cleft chin made her face interesting rather than blandly beautiful coupled with her golden hair and skin. Maybe his mind could have thought up this beautiful witch dressed all in Parisian blue, with a feathered and netted hat perched jauntily on her head, but it never could have supplied her with that mouth. Too narrow for her wide face and plump, such a mouth should have looked soft, kissable, but the determined set of her jaw made it seem almost hard, unyielding.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“May I help you, Miss?” he managed to ask after a moment, managing a short stilted version of the bow a proper Pure-Blood should give to a lady newly arrived at his dwelling.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Actually,” she replied, shifting her shoulders under her fur-edged cloak and producing a small beaded bag from within, “I'm hoping that I could be of service to you. I'm a portraitist, and I was made aware that the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black has no imbued likenesses of its current members. I've got examples of my work in this bag and I'd love the chance to paint such arresting features.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You're here to sell me a portrait.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes,” she replied, seemingly uncowed by his obvious skepticism.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Come in then, we can set up in the library and I can take a look at your work,” Regulus said, continuing even as she walked past him, veering to the left as though she already knew exactly where the library was. “It's just to the left there.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She unpacked the tiny beaded bag with efficiency, pulling out several stands and nearly a dozen completed portraits, only one of whom he recognized: the gigantic Hogwarts gamekeeper, tending to a huge pumpkin in his patch, intimate and familiar and timeless. The rest were of various strangers, red-headed children and a young man with a shock of blue hair. There was a professional looking portrait of a brown-skinned woman with wild, bushy hair and a look about her eyes that said she wasn't to be trifled with. A beautiful woman who looked much like the portraitist herself, but older and thinner, with eerie eyes of palest blue; she was accompanied by a man with long red hair, a scarred face, and the portraitist's warm hazel eyes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Your parents?” Regulus asked, pointing at the painting of the older couple, the occupants sneaking warm smiles at each other.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes. It is a duplicate of my gift to them for their 20</span>
  <span>th</span>
  <span> anniversary,” she replied.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Your work is beautiful. It reminds me of Sargent. You haven't shied away from impressionist influence, like so many wizarding portraitists.” He tried not to be offended by the slight shock on her face when he mentioned the famous Muggle painter. “Are any of them fully creative or are they all imbued?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“The originals are. Most of these are duplicates; they don't speak.” She directed him to the bushy-haired woman's portrait. “Hermione here will talk to you, though. The witch who sat for her is out of the country at the moment and asked me to hold on to her for a while.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Madame,” he said, bowing politely to the woman in the frame.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nice to meet you, sir,” the woman said in a smooth, educated accent. “If you need a portrait done I can attest that I'm happy with Miss Delacour's work.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Miss Delacour?” Regulus replied. “French then? Thank you for that information. Your creator seems to have forgotten her introduction in her desperation to make a sale.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That isn't surprising. I believe you'll be her first portrait that isn't of a family member or close family friend, and yes, she's French on her mother's side. They sent her to Beauxbatons for her education.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Aunt Hermione!” The portraitist hissed, her face flushing a pretty pink as she self-consciously fidgeted with a thin golden chain that disappeared between her breasts, hiding whatever pendant dangled at the end.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don't be embarrassed, Miss Delacour,” Regulus said warmly, turning away from the portraits. “We all have to start somewhere, and I find I am actually in rather desperate need of a portrait.” Desperate didn't begin to cover it. He could feel his death approaching with imminent speed. “I will need you to work quickly. Can you come back in the afternoons for the forseeable future? My mother takes her luncheon with other ladies at this time every day and I'd rather not explain your presence, as she would think your being here without a chaperon quite unseemly.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes I can do that,” she replied quickly. “I have no other projects currently.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Good. I will give you one hundred fifty galleons for supplies and other necessities up front, and another hundred and fifty upon completion of the portrait. Is that a fair fee?” He asked, knowing that it was more than fair and hoping it was enough to secure her discretion.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Thank you Mr. Black,” she replied, waving her wand quickly over the handful of coins and making them whiz into her bag one by one before hurriedly returning the paintings to her bag, clearly desperate to get on her way before his mother could return.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mr. Black sounds formal, like you're speaking to my father, though he'd probably insist you refer to him as Lord Black,” Regulus said, giving her what he hoped was a kind smile. “Please, call me Regulus.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You can call me Victoire if you like,” she replied as she stored the last of her work and reached out to shake on their deal. Regulus tried very hard to ignore the way his heart raced at the feel of the tiny calluses on her palms. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>*********************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was incredibly hard to walk through her aunt and uncle's home and pretend like she'd never been there before. Victoire found herself turning at the head of the main stair as they went up, when she should have hesitated and waited for Regulus to show her the way.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She cursed herself for not maintaining her cover as well as Aunt Hermione's portrait had. It was as competent as the witch herself, and entirely too good at lying, sprinkling in little truths that made the entire charade sound more real and explained Victoire's nervousness.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This is where we'll work,” Regulus informed her as they reached the attic, confirming what she'd known from the background of the finished portrait. “I've given it a thorough airing out so it shouldn't be too unpleasant to work in.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I'm sure it will be just fine,” she replied, glad that he seemed not to have noticed her familiarity with the house. She wandered over to the bank of large windows, just cracked open to let in a bit of damp London air.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was eerie, seeing that Regulus had set up the exact background and seating that had been in the painting without any guidance on her part. She'd known that he would, because that was how time travel worked. It was a closed loop and whatever happened while she was in the past would have definitionally already happened, including any changes she tried to enact. . . but knowing that and experiencing it were two different things.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The change in clothes transformed him from the intimidating wizard whose skepticism she could almost taste to the complicated young man she'd been so determined to come back and preserve. The lighter colors of his vest and shirtsleeves set off his pale skin and dark mop of hair, making him look softer, younger. Far too young to die.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How shall we start?” he asked, relaxing into the chair with his hands clasped in his lap until his resemblance to his future portrait became uncanny.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don't. move.” Victoire replied, conjuring a drawing table and pulling her sketch set out from the depths of the beaded bag. “Stay just like that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Can I blink?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Can I breathe?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Can I talk?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not if you are going to keep asking annoying questions.” She said, rolling her eyes. “But yes. I'm going to make several sketches today, but just the broad strokes.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I had wondered how the process worked,” Regulus admitted, his eyes following her pencil as it moved over the large pad of paper. “I know that they don't move unless they are enchanted, but I wasn't sure if the painting was anything like what Muggles do or if it was all wandwork.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“There's actually very minimal spellcraft in creating a portrait. My paints are more magical than a Muggle artist’s, because magical ingredients take the end enchantments better, but the charms that bring the painting to life are all done at the very end.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So could a Muggle paint a magical portrait?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Theoretically, yes,” Victoire replied, focusing on the way Regulus's shoulders had relaxed, loosening the lines of his pose. “There are actually magical copies of several masterpieces by the Muggle artist Gustav Klimt, commissioned under the Imperius curse during Grindelwald's reign. None of them have fared well through the years. Muggles cannot safely handle many of the ingredients included in wizarding paints, unfortunately, and Muggle paints are not designed to withstand the movement of the enchantments, they crack and degrade. Squibs are another matter. Some of the most celebrated painters in the wizarding world have been Squibs with a magical spouse or relative who imbued their work.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You're passionate about this work.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I am. It's a privilege to make art, and a necessity. It keeps us human.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That is a beautiful sentiment. I have a friend who would agree with you, Lucius Malfoy.” Victoire tried hard to mask her sharp intake of breath at his words as she remembered the haunted face of that man when the </span>
  <em>
    <span>Prophet</span>
  </em>
  <span> reported on his release from a ten-year stint in Azkaban. “His family values beauty and creativity in a way that mine does not, though I think we did once upon a time. If you look under the sheets here you will find dozens of paintings, but there's almost none in the main house. My mother has always disparaged art as frivolous and sentimental.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I find that is often true of people who always find others wanting,” Victoire replied, having heard horror stories about the woman's portrait all her life but feeling the apology necessary to tack on regardless. “Meaning no offense to your mother of course.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Regulus surprised her, releasing a harsh peal of bitter laughter that sent goosebumps over her skin before replying, “You're not wrong.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>****************************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire was a different person when she was working.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When he'd found her at his door step she'd been stuttering, overly polite, awkward even. Regulus had only said yes to her offer out of desperation and curiosity at how she had found her way to his front door. As the days wore on he found that the mystery played second fiddle to the joy of her company.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Once she got to painting, her face would set with such seriousness that it would create a tiny worry line between her brows as they drew slowly together, mouth tensed with focus. Her voice lost the polite, girlish lilt, becoming raspy. She wore her hair pulled back severely and put on a beige smock over her billowing skirts as soon as she arrived, ruining the elegant picture of a fashionable young lady without a second thought.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He could have watched her paint every day for the rest of his life. Maybe he would.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What is your family like?” he asked as she painted details into his carefully rolled shirt sleeves, a shiver running up his spine as she extended her little finger to smudge the paint. “An English girl at Beauxbatons, there has to be an interesting story there.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“My parents both work as Curse-Breakers,” she replied, each word coming slowly as she focused on her work. “When I was young my mum stayed home, but as us kids got older she worked more, and curse-breaking requires travel. She and Dad were working in Paris when I got to be school-aged, and since my mum is a French national I was invited to attend.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did your parents meet on the job?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes. In Egypt. Mum was a junior Curse-Breaker under Dad for a while. I get the idea it was all considered rather scandalous. Dad had long hair and he wears this ridiculous earring, it made him seem like quite the cad. His mum wasn't overly impressed with my mum either, thought she was too pretty to be of much use. In reality my parents are both as much academic as they are adventurous, and hopelessly romantic.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sounds like they are a good match,” Regulus replied, thinking about his own parents’ strained relationship. He couldn't imagine them sleeping in the same rooms, much less traveling to work together.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It's been over twenty years and they still seem desperately in love.” Victoire’s lips twitched into a soft smile as she said it, and that half-suppressed expression of her affection for her parents spoke volumes to Regulus. He wished that someone would smile like that when they thought of him, if only for a moment. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I truly don't know any couples like that. No one I have ever known well married for love. They married for propriety, power, money, but never love,” he mused, thinking over the couples he knew. The Malfoys seemed to like each other well enough but there wasn't any particular spark there. “Well, I do have one cousin, married a Muggle-born boy fresh out of Hogwarts, but she was disinherited for that choice.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire stiffened so severely that he thought she might pack up and leave.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don't agree with the decision to disinherit her, just to be clear,” he assured her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“The bit of brand I've just finished painting on your arm says that you aren't very supportive either, Regulus,” she whispered, hazel eyes flickering to land on the dark mark peeking out from his sleeve, her obvious disgust making his chest ache.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I guess I shouldn't be surprised you know what that mark means, with how often my brethren fly it over their atrocities.” Regulus had to fight the urge to cover the dark mark on his arm. He wasn't used to anyone looking at it who didn't have one of their own. He had only decided not to glamour it at the last moment, wanting the portrait to be honest. “I've made many poor decisions trying to be an obedient son. If I could go back and choose again I wouldn't have joined up with them. It was the worst mistake of my life and I have a feeling I will be paying for it very soon. I just hope I can make some better choices before then.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire didn't respond to his confession, simply nodding and returning her focus to her work, brush moving in long deliberate strokes over the pattern of his shirt.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>***************************************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She'd never seen the painting awoken, so Victoire had no idea how it looked when at rest. All paintings had a default, no matter how active, a position in which they tended to find themselves. It showed the original composition and had little to do with what they looked like under an enchanted slumber, waiting for their subject to die or their charm to be deactivated.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She'd stuck with what the composition had looked like in sleep mostly because it was engaging. Regulus looked good slightly slumped in his chair, shirt sleeves rolled up, with the afternoon lighting bringing out warmth in his dark hair. Still, she was an artist and creative license was hers to take. So when it came time to paint in the details of his face she allowed herself the leeway of choosing his expression.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You are going to have to sit still this time, Regulus,” she instructed, tilting his face up and towards the light from the window so that the sunlight eased the sharp lines of his face and made his pale grey eyes otherworldly, her heart skipping a beat as their gazes connected. “No talking while I'm working. I understand no one's mind is made of stone so we will break every fifteen minutes. It shouldn't be too miserable. I won't make you smile or anything. Just keep your face neutral, tiny natural movements are okay.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If I'm not going to talk you'll have to entertain me,” he'd said, grinning up at her as she tilted his head to check the light from different angles.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I'm going to be working, how am I supposed to do that?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Talk about something, anything really. Just don't leave me staring at you in silence for the entire afternoon,” Regulus replied, tacking on, “- not that you aren't lovely.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fine,” Victoire conceded, changing the configuration of her easel so that she could sit just out of the light, silently wishing that she could hide the blush creeping over her ears at his compliment.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I guess I could tell you about why I settled on painting. Mind you, I think the story is quite boring,” she began, trying to remember the few lies she hadn't been able to avoid telling so far. Just that she'd gone to Beauxbatons, really. “I was clever enough in school. Good grades, stayed mostly out of trouble, spent my time with other clever, hardworking students. I had set my mind to Charms, not because I cared for them particularly, but because I had a natural talent for them, unlike Herbology for instance, which I was truly terrible at. I tell people I have a red thumb because that's opposite green on the color wheel. I could kill a cactus.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She grinned as his lips twitched with a suppressed laugh. It felt good to be able to give the details of her life. He had been open with her, chatting about his strained relationship with his brother, expressing his regrets about his current situation in the war, and peppering her with dozens of questions about every topic. She hadn't lied much, but she'd had to hold back so much to keep from revealing things he shouldn't know. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I took on early internships with my parents' employer, hoping to sign on as a Curse-Breaker even though it wasn't something I was really interested in. I was mostly interested in excelling. The only time I didn't spend on my charm work was with my boyfriend.” She saw his eyebrow flicked upward for an almost imperceptible second at that. “We'd known each other since we were little and he still is my best friend in all the world, but mostly being with him was easy. Just like everything else I was doing. You can take a five minute rest.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, but now I'm interested! You can keep going,” Regulus insisted, barely moving his lips to ask. “What happened with the boyfriend?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I got bored,” Victoire continued with a sigh,“Just like I did with my studies. Had an episode just before winter holiday my seventh year, broke up with Teddy and stopped going to classes, barely left bed for two weeks. My parents kept me out of school for almost a month after.” She focused on the fine lines near his eyes, brushing in the pink shadows at the crease of his lid. “We toured every Muggle museum in Paris and London, and went through the special wizarding exhibits at the Louvre and the British Museum, and for the first time in a long time I was truly interested in something. I loved being surrounded by the paintings everyday, and I just knew I wanted to do that for the rest of my life. I was already good at charms, so I focused my studies on history and potions, so I could pursue both painting and curating. Did a four year apprenticeship in two and here I am.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire could see the tension in his neck from holding still for so long. She wanted to reach out and rub it away for him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You really do need to take a break or you're going to get a crick in your neck.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Regulus listened to her this time, leaning back in the chair so that he could rest his neck against the top and letting his eyes flutter shut at the relief to his strained muscles. Victoire took the opportunity to walk around a bit and stretch her legs as well. Days of painting had taken its toll on her back and made her restless.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What about you, Regulus?” she asked, walking the length of the window and calculating how much longer she could paint without the light changing. “What are you passionate about?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was silent for a long moment before answering.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I have never been particularly passionate about anything. I never really felt like I had much of a choice in what my life would be. That became even truer after my older brother was disowned.” His eyes were hazy, lost in memory as he spoke. “I suddenly bore the brunt of my family's standing, my parents’ expectations, and my safety all alone. My classmates might as well have been spies, as well as my family, and everyone was reporting back to the Dark Lord. I did what I could to reduce suspicion and save my own hide. It's only recently I've come to realize there's something I care about more than surviving.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What could be more important than survival?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Being a good man,” he said quietly, eyes still faraway as he returned to his seat, leaving Victoire feeling as though a rock was lodged beneath her sternum as they spent the rest of the afternoon in silence filled only by the shush of her brush on the canvas.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*********************</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This is our last session then?” Regulus asked as Victoire apparated into the attic exactly on time, as she had every afternoon since they began.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It's our last day painting. I will imbue the portrait and then put an overnight drying charm on it before I leave this evening. I will need to come back tomorrow if you'd like me to set the stasis charm to keep it asleep until you've died or are ready for it to wake.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That would be necessary. Even if he were to die very soon he couldn't have his portrait blabbing something to the wrong person before he could collect the Horcrux. He'd already made up his mind to go to the cave when his mother left for her lunch the day after they were finished, but stranger things had happened in a day than someone stumbling onto a painting in an attic.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So am I back to staying still as a statue today?” He tried to refocus on their purpose and not the unpleasantness that lay ahead.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No, just hold the rough position,” she answered, pulling out her palette, overflowing with soft greys and peaches. “Honestly I doubt it takes me an hour.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh good, then I can pester you with questions while you work.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Can I take it back?” Victoire teased. “I think your hair will look fine without this last highlight.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Of course not. I can't have you half-assing my best feature,” Regulus insisted, his jaw tensing painfully as he cut his eyes to her face and asked the question that had been bothering him since he met her, knowing this might be his last opportunity. “Besides, I'm desperate to know how you found this house.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She stiffened so suddenly he worried that she might have streaked the white paint on the tip of her brush across the whole portrait.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You don't have to answer, Victoire. You can imbue the portrait and I'll pay you and you can leave. I'm sure I can figure out the sleeping charm on my own,” he assured her, backtracking at the obvious fear on her face and glad he'd already learned the less complicated magics for the portrait on his own. “But I hope you realize I don't mean to use the information to hurt you. You already know I'm not the loyal Death Eater I appear to be. It's just been driving me mad that I can't figure it out.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire didn't answer for a long time. She placed in her final details with complete focus and determination, somehow never quite seeming to see Regulus even when she was looking directly into his eyes. He wanted to push but he didn't dare risk her running before he got her to imbue the portrait. So he sat quietly and watched emotions flit across her expressive face as she worked. Her brows would pull together with worry, jaw tightening with determination, then something would shift and for a moment her whole visage would soften. She'd have been a terrible Slytherin, that was for certain. No one with anything to hide should be this easy to read.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I'm done,” she said, her tools suddenly vanishing with a flick of her wand, worried eyes still locked onto his portrait. “I need to imbue it and set the drying charms. Then I’ll tell you whatever you want to know, Regulus.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He responded with a curt nod, whatever answer he might give her lost in the feeling of a noose tightening around his throat. They were done. Nothing left to hold him back from his duty now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I need you to touch the paint just here, where the paint is still wet.” She pointed at the bottom edge of the painting where she'd just painted a dark shadow into the bend of his knee. The paint moved under his finger, slick and viscous to the touch. “Just don't break contact until I tell you to.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Imbuing was as strange a magic as Regulus had ever encountered. Victoire slowly chanted, her voice droning as she waved her wand in an intricate pattern over first his face and then down his arm to the painting, the tip touching occasionally along his temple, his closed eyelid, the tip of his nose, the corner of his mouth, his shoulder, his elbow. He could feel the magic building as she worked, vibrating just under his skin. He lost track of her chanting as his memories seemed to well up through his mind, flashes of Sirius' barking laugh, his mother's stiff shoulders silhouetted in a doorway, a flash of red breaking through the deep blue glamour on the dark lord's eyes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her wand slid down his fingertip towards the painting, and in the moment before it touched the surface of the portrait she broke the rhythm of her chant, voice low and determined as she finished and cast a three word spell with a light tap of her wand against the canvas.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>Simulacrum. Animus. Pictura.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The power that had been building under Regulus's skin was suddenly pulled from him, moving quickly down through his arm and into the paint, which felt suddenly warm under his fingertip. He looked intently at his own face on the canvas as his likeness slowly filled with life. A breath of wind seemed to stir his hair, as it had on the afternoon she'd painted the dark mark on his arm. Then his eyes were not just open, they were staring, hardening as the fog of creation cleared. As the portrait's fingers twitched Regulus saw his eyes flick to the woman behind him, filled with heat that felt both intimately familiar and surprising.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You can remove your hand.” Victoire whispered after a moment.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I'm going to go change into something more comfortable. Cast your drying charm and do the same if you'd like. I'd like to take tea while we talk. Kreacher,” Regulus called, still feeling choked with emotion. “Bring me a cup of tea and get Victoire whatever she needs.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>**********</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Kreacher had set out tea on the same ancient cups that he still favored in the future unless you requested the less fragile china that Aunt Ginny and Uncle Harry had gotten for their wedding. Sipping her milky tea out of the familiar paper-thin porcelain with the delicate black and white floral pattern grounded Victoire as she waited for Regulus to return.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She knew that she should use the moment of privacy to pull out Aunt Hermione's modified time turner from its hiding spot between her breasts and set the dial to take her back home. The portrait was finished and properly imbued. She could set the sleeping charm right now; despite what she'd told Regulus, there was no need to wait for it to dry. There was really no reason she needed to stay here. With him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Victoire didn't want to leave.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When she left he was going to die. That was true. There was nothing she could do to change it. He had to go to the cave and retrieve Tom Riddle's Horcrux from the basin. You couldn't change the past. Even if you tried, things would always end up with the same result. His future couldn't be changed and Victoire found she couldn't stand it. The feeling of grief for this young man that had led her to return to the past and ensure that his portrait was properly created and preserved hadn't disappeared as she completed her mission. As she got to know him better, the feeling had solidified into a painful lump in her chest that she couldn't dislodge.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As Regulus reappeared, looking vulnerable in a soft velvet robe tied simply at the waist, the lump gave a threatening lurch that made her fear she was going to vomit.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I believe you owe me an explanation,” he said, sitting down in what she'd come to think of as his chair, grey eyes warm in the late afternoon sun.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire had no warning from the inner workings of her mind as the entire story spilled out of her in a great rush, like the tears suddenly spilling into her tea.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I was able to find your door because I have been to this house before. Many times, all through my childhood, to visit my aunt and uncle who own this home in the future. I know that you will think this sounds impossible, and you should be right. But I can prove to you it's the truth. I know about the Horcrux and I know that you are going to steal it, very soon if my time table is any indication.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How do you know it is soon?” he whispered, lip quivering.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“B-Because the last time you were seen alive is tomorrow morning,” Victoire replied hesitantly, almost choking on knowledge gleaned from an old Aurors’ report on his disappearance. “When you kissed your mother good morning before heading out for the day.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I'm going to die then.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She nodded, unable to say it out loud.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did I at least get rid of the damned thing and make him mortal again?” he asked, voice cracking under the gravity of his immediate future, the sound of it breaking her heart.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You died before you could destroy it, but you played your part,” she answered honestly, wishing not for the first time that she was a better liar. “He will fall for the second time before I am born, after all of his Horcruxes are destroyed.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why did you come here?” he asked.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not to change anything. I can't — that's not how time works.” She flinched at the resignation that filled his eyes as she said it, feeling more selfish than she ever had before. “I found the painting, but it wouldn't awaken. There was no signature so there was no reason it couldn't have been mine, and I needed to know what word you sealed it with, so I could wake it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There was a long moment of intense silence, his gaze never breaking from her’s, emotions flitting over his face, before he walked over and knelt in front of her. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Thank you for coming, Victoire.” He set her teacup carefully to the side so that he could take both of her hands in his own, pain and affection evident in the trembling of his gentle touch. “Thank you for telling me that in the end the Dark Lord will fall, so I won't go to my grave wondering if my sacrifice meant anything. Thank you for filling my last days with beauty, and companionship that I have never known.” His eyes stayed locked on hers, his tears having slowed so that the glistening looked less like grief than determination. “You have given me more than I deserve but I am facing the end and I cannot help but ask one more thing of you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What, Regulus?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Give me one last first kiss?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire didn't hesitate. The moment their lips touched, everything faded away until it seemed they were the only two people who existed. Regulus's mouth was soft and warm and tasted of black tea salted with tears. He pulled her against him by the front of her skirt, leaving her sprawled awkwardly as the chair tipped her onto the floor with him. His hands were everywhere: pulling her hair down, tracing over the line of her jaw, trailing down her throat and into the wide neck of her bodice.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I've got to have you closer now,” he said, breaking their kiss to whisper in her ear, voice rough with desire. “I want to feel alive.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire nodded, vanishing her modest, vintage robes that had bunched between them with a desperate surge of the accidental magic she hadn't felt since childhood. He shrugged out of his bathrobe and lowered her gently onto her back, his hips snug between her thighs. Endless romantic stories would have described their coming together as beautiful: fated. It wasn't. It was an anguished, last-ditch scrabble for a moment of intimacy and pleasure, his hips snapping, a thumb rubbing roughly over her clit as he drove home again and again, breath hot against the side of her neck as she felt her cunt clench around him and he groaned, “Thank you,” spilling deep inside her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He held onto her for hours afterwards, not speaking but clutching her tightly against his hard chest until she drifted into an exhausted slumber.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When she woke she was alone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Regulus,” she whispered groggily into the grey, early morning light, afraid to attract the attention of anyone else in the house.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He didn't respond and she sat up, shrugging into the velvet robe that had been draped over her. She was confused, listening to the bustling of someone down stairs while she tried desperately not to make any noise that might betray that someone else was in their home. But that only lasted a moment before her eyes landed on the portrait sitting a few feet away, propped against another stack of canvases, the subject clearly in a deep slumber.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He'd gone. At some point he'd learned the charm for putting a portrait to sleep and he'd done it himself. She remembered the note '</span>
  <em>
    <span>It's lovely. Good-bye.'</span>
  </em>
  <span> It hadn't been a compliment to the portraitist at all, it was the word that would wake his likeness. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was gone, off to sacrifice himself for the greater good. He would never be seen alive again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire's brain whirred as the story she'd heard a million times rushed in her mind. Disappeared. He had disappeared. His death had been attributed to Voldemort, but no one seemed to know the details. That vagueness had plagued her as she had figured out how to come back, pinpointing dates close to his final mission, and she suddenly knew that this was why she'd really come back. The painting was just an excuse.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She couldn't let him die without at least trying to save him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She paced the attic, shuffling her feet over the floorboards quietly as she ran through everything she knew about the man she was desperate to save, every moment of the last week swirling through her mind as she tried to figure out how to get to a location that she'd never visited.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Kreacher!” she whispered as an idea finally struck her, her heartbeat stuttering as she heard the blessed crack of the house elf's arrival, launching into her request before he could speak and hoping desperately that he'd accept her logic as she looked into his hollow, angry eyes. “Regulus told you to give me whatever I need when he went to get dressed yesterday. I need Regulus, Kreacher. I need him and if I don't get him he will die.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The elf cracked away without another word, leaving her in the attic for an interminable moment as she grasped the time turner from its place between her breasts and hastily hid the portrait, trusting that she couldn’t change where she’d found it in the future.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Crack!</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Kreacher popped into existence barely holding onto Regulus's weight, the young man dropping fully onto the floor, the loud thud sending a thrill of fear up her spine. She crawled the few feet to them, pulling the time turner's chain until she could fit it over Regulus's neck, pulling his shaking body up towards her and trying to ignore the pained shouts pleading for her life as he recognized her, interspersed with desperate pleas for water.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Kreacher,” she said quickly, turning the dial on the time turner to send her four decades into the future. “I need you to never tell anyone that I've been here. Not even me. Not until September 19</span>
  <span>th</span>
  <span>, 2020, you'll know her by then. Then you can tell Hermione Granger he's been to the cave and we are coming. I need you to be in the attic that day. All day. Do this and I will bring you back your Master.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She didn't wait for him to answer, trusting in the mantra that she couldn't have changed the future that had already happened and releasing the dial that spun the turner. The horrible sensation of traveling through the years, so much faster than the hour-long jumps that the world around them was not so much sped up as it was a stark white blur filled with the screech of a thousand conversations rushing around them. It felt never ending as she held Regulus tight to her, not even able to feel his breath and hoping that she had remembered the properties of the potion correctly; Draught of despair, nasty but not deadly as long as he made it out of the cave and away from the Inferi.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The infernal racket of the turns stopped suddenly, leaving Victoire wobbling on her knees and head aching terribly as a much-aged Kreacher croaked “Master Regulus! You musts drink!” and shuffled over to them with a pitcher of water.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Victoire released her grip on him reluctantly as he scrambled for the cup of water, eyes still unfocused and radiating panic as he slaked his thirst. Aunt Hermione knelt over the elderly elf and his newly returned young master, tipping a vial of Dreamless Sleep into the pitcher of water before raising eyes full of pride to meet her niece's gaze.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Welcome home.”</span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p>
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